Waste oil burners are designed primarily to handle petroleum oils that have been contaminated in the course of their intended uses. Such oils can include motor sump oils, lubricating oils, hydraulic oils, cutting oils, dirty fuel oils, old heating oils, etc. Conventional waste oil burners operate in limited circumstances to capture the embodied energy value of these waste oils for space heating, process heating, hot water production and similar purposes. In existing approaches, the majority of waste oil combustion systems require the waste oil to be pre-filtered to avoid clogging of an orifice dispersion system; that is, a burner system that sprays pre-heated oil through a constricted nozzle so that it atomizes and passes through the path of the igniter.
In existing approaches, the waste oils must also contain relatively trivial amounts of emulsified or suspended water or suspended solids for proper operation. Most power burners that are used in waste oil combustion systems also incorporate an air compressor, a relatively high-pressure pump and one or more electric resistance heaters in the fuel stream, all part of a system that is used to atomize what is otherwise an especially viscous and dense fluid. The atomized droplets are ignited using a high voltage electric spark in the focused mist stream. The burner head (also referred to as a nozzle) is a conventional device by which a liquid fuel stream is atomized. The resulting flame is directed into a heating appliance, such as a boiler or furnace.
However, a need exists in providing an oil burner system that overcomes the tendency of conventional burners to carbonize or otherwise obstruct the orifice of the burner head over time. Additional improvements would reduce the amount of electrical resistance heating, leading to reduced operating costs. Also, reduced fuel preprocessing would save labor and additional costs.
With the lessening of petroleum reserves, there is a need to generate liquid fuels that are made from waste and/or renewable materials. By way of example, in the case of restaurants and food service facilities, waste oil from frying and food processing is typically collected and transported to a rendering plant where the water is removed and the resulting oil is filtered through very narrow mesh (micron) screens and filters or is vacuum-distilled and the resultant refined product is then sold to various users, such as a biodiesel producer. These same restaurants, in order to provide for their domestic hot water needs, might also buy the resulting biodiesel or conventional heating oil for their oil-fired hot water or space-heating appliance.
Accordingly, a need exists to more effectively utilize waste oils on-site for use as fuel to meet energy needs and reduce the need for transport and refinement.